NOAA Response to March 2007 FOI Request

I received the following response today from Tom Karl regarding my 2007 FOI request (See here):

As previously indicated in my e-mail last Thursday, NCDC did indeed put together a response to your official FOIA request, but due to a miscommunication between our office and our headquarters, the response was not submitted to you. I deeply apologize for this oversight, and we have taken measures to ensure this does not happen in the future. Attached for your reference is the actual response to your inquiry that was provided on April 4, 2007. Please let me know if I or my office may assist you further. Thank you.

I request the following information in connection with this article co-authored by NCDC scientist Thomas Karl.

A) the identification of the stations used in the following three Jones et al 1990 networks:

1. the west Russian network
2. the Chinese network
3. the Australian network

B) identification of the stations used in the gridded network for comparison

C) the data as used by Jones et al for each of the above stations

Here is their response:
Response:

A.1. NCDC contacted Dr. Groisman who provided Dr. Jones with the data for the west Russian network. Dr. Groisman is located at NCDC but is not a Federal employee. No information on the Chinese or Australian networks is available at NCDC as these data were provided by others.

These data were provided to Dr. Groisman for research and are not his to distribute. NCDC neither maintains nor distributes these data. While the stations in this list are from Russia, Latvia, Belarus, Ukraine, and Kazakhstan, prior to 1990 these data were stored in one place and can be requested from the All-Russian Research Institute of Hydrometeorological Information – World Data Center-B, 6 Koroleva Street, Obninsk, 249020 Kaluga region, Russia (Director of the Institute, Prof. Marcel Z. Shaimardanov).

C) The only data a U.S. government author used in the cited paper was for U.S. An exact replicate of those data are no longer available having undergone continued update and adjustment including the addition of new data and metadata. The earliest digital version of the HCN data is the 1996 release which is updated continuously and available (no charge) at: ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/ushcn/urban_mean_fahr.Z. This document will need to be opened with UNIX uncompressed command. From that dataset, the listed stations can be extracted as either raw or adjusted data (adjusted data were used in the Jones et al. article). The data will not exactly match those used in the Jones et al article, but for purposes of testing the analysis as described in that article, there were no major changes in adjustment methods in the data through 1984. For data after 1984 there was an additional correction for introduction of the Maximum Minimum Temperature Sensor (MMTS) measurements at Cooperative Observing Stations, some of which are stations in the HCN.

Additionally, there are microfiche available that contain data plots of all stations in ORNL/CDIAC-30, NDP-019/R1, 1990, “United States Historical Climatology Network (HCN) Serial Temperature and Precipitation Data” by T.R. Karl, C.N. Williams Jr., F.T. Quinlan and T.A. Boden , Environmental Sciences Division Publication No. 3404. Hardcopy (paper) of these fiche can be provided at a cost of $596.00.

An exact replicate of those data are no longer available having undergone continued update and adjustment including the addition of new data and metadata.

Mechanisms for storing and retrieving individual versions of source material have been available since the early 60’s. Perhaps earlier.

The idea that the people in charge of this data would allow original data to be over written has me so utterly flabbergasted, that I’m tempted to say the kind of things that would get this post deleted.

This kind of incompetance (that’s the only polite word I could think of) would be unacceptable in a grad student. The idea that, supposedly, world class scientists repeatedly engage in it, has me sputtering with incredulity.

For new visitors to the thread, the reason all this matters is that the Jones et al. 1990 paper was cited in the IPCC 3rd and 4th Assessment Reports as the clinching argument why there is no urbanization bias in the surface temperature records over land. If readers are tempted to think this is all a bunch of nitpicking, hounding authors for old data, getting huffy about minor record-keeping omissions, etc; before jumping to that conclusion go back and read the relevant sections of TAR and AR4. There is a huge literature showing urbanization bias in climate records around the world. The IPCC has taken the view that while these matter in specific locations, the problem washes out globally. They still rely on Jones et al. 1990 for this claim, and invoke it as a reason to set aside all the contrary evidence. Jones et al. 1990 is not an old empty shack out in the back field, it’s a load-bearing wall right through the ground floor of the IPCC’s new building. It matters if nobody can see the data or replicate the results.

I think Ross in #10 nails it as to why this matters. As one who long ago published some articles in peer reviewed journals for which I no longer have the data, I’m certainly sympathetic to the fact that expectations for archiving data were not as rigorous :) many years ago as they were today. But then my papers are not being continually cited for major conclusions or policy implications. Were they, and the data were no longer available, I would consider it reasonable for someone to try to replicate my results, and if they could not, then I would not expect my findings to be further cited or relied upon. Replication is a bedrock principle of the scientific endeavor, and scientific work that cannot be replicated doesn’t pass the smell test.

Many local studies have demonstrated that the microclimate within cities is on average warmer, with a smaller DTR, than if the city were not there. However, the key issue from a climate change standpoint is whether urban-affected temperature records have significantly biased large-scale temporal trends. Studies that have looked at hemispheric and global scales conclude that any urban-related trend is an order of magnitude smaller than decadal and longer time-scale trends evident in the series (e.g., Jones et al., 1990; Peterson et al., 1999).

But it’s been very hard to get traction on what went into Jones et al 1990, until the FOI process was applied and we got some information last year. It was Jones who said “We have 25 years invested in this….”.

In my opinion, it hasn’t just been the FOI process but the combination of Climate Audit and FOI that’s finally enabled identificaiton of the stations. CRU stonewalled the FOI process as well (as witness Willis’ unsuccessful attempts.) Only after I started exposing these obstructions here at a popular blog was some progress made. Others helped of course. Doug Keenan kept writing to institutions, but my own surmise is that it’s the sunshine here that they’ve hated.

Merely reporting their excuses was a merciless satire on the institutions and very bad publicity. So we’ve got some grudging information.

This kind of incompetance (that’s the only polite word I could think of) would be unacceptable in a grad student. The idea that, supposedly, world class scientists repeatedly engage in it, has me sputtering with incredulity.

Heck, it would be unacceptable in an undergrad student. It wouldn’t be tolerated in many high schools either.

Incompetance? Sweet irony there Mark! Maybe you SHOULD think of another word!

22907 1881-1988 60.1 27.0 Gogland – That is the former Finnish island of Suursaari (Höglandet in Swedish). It is long and narrow piece of land, about 20 sq.km, halfway between Helsinki and St. Petersburg, at mercy of the Baltic sea. Population at most did not exceed 2 000, except maybe in the summers of the 1930’s, when it was a popular tourist resort for the better off Finns. During the war it changed hands three times and was evacuated twice. After the war it has remained military territory; there has been a small garrison, a lighthouse and some signal intelligence operations. So it should be a rural site, with gaps in weather data at least between 1939-1944.

Re: #9,
Ross McK,
I think that you are being kind in saying that Jone et al 1990 is a load bearing wall. I might descride it as the bolts which hold a building on its foundation in an earthquake prone region of the Pacific Rim.

As previously indicated in my e-mail last Thursday, NCDC did indeed put together a response to your official FOIA request, but due to a miscommunication between our office and our headquarters, the response was not submitted to you

C) The only data a U.S. government author used in the cited paper was for U.S. An exact replicate of those data are no longer available having undergone continued update and adjustment including the addition of new data and metadata.

What part of that don’t you understand? The original data, the exact data used for one of the AGW lynch-pin studies, is no longer available.

Ross M. and Steve M. thanks for 9 and 12. It is helpful to tie this all together. Please correct me if I misunderstand. I conclude from the above that the IPCC’s key conclusions on the effect of Urban Heat Islands on global warming is not replicable and, therefore, unsupportable. But even more embarassing is that key contributors to these conclusions have essentially hidden the non-replicability for, I’m guessing, about 3 years since you’ve started asking? My recollection is that Tom Karl’s above response is the only one you’ve had that even hints the IPCC urban heat island conclusions are not replicable.

Re: Comment 10, asking “I wonder if there is a way to challenge (in court) the passage of expensive laws, which passage was based on evidence that can not now be produced in the court.”

No, but were Jones called to offer expert testimony on his opinion as expressed in his 1990 paper, and he could not produce the date upon which it was based, his opinion would be excluded as unreliable. As a Florida Appellate Court stated in a similar circumstance:

For two reasons we must reverse the judgment and remand the case for a new trial. The first reason is that the person the county called as a witness as to the value of the property was unable or unwilling to provide the court and jury with proper documentation and support for his opinion as to the value of the property being taken. Although he said that he “used market data, interviews with [persons] and other materials . . . to come up with these adjustments,” on cross-examination he would not or could not produce any of the market data or names of persons to support his statements. His testimony was inherently incredible. . . . Once that skunk was thrown in the jury box, the trial should have been aborted”

C) The only data a U.S. government author used in the cited paper was for U.S. An exact replicate of those data are no longer available having undergone continued update and adjustment including the addition of new data and metadata.

What part of that don’t you understand? The original data, the exact data used for one of the AGW lynch-pin studies, is no longer available.

So, my interpretation of this is that while there is no exact digital duplicate of the original data, there are hardcopy plots from all the temperature stations available. I’m pretty sure hardcopy, rather than digital archiving was still quite common practice back in the early 90’s.

Your interpretation is incorrect. They are stating that an exact replicate is not available, but they have some stuff that is kind of similar, and other non-digital stuff that could be used to make something similar if someone somehow new exactly what was done.

Since this originated as a government-funded program, we should expect NOAA to have known about it. Given your experience with them, I cannot rate them as other than “Level 1″: lacking sound management practices, unpredictable and ad-hoc.

__________________________________________

Refc 1:
Technical Report CMU/SEI-93-TR-025 ESC-TR-93-178 Key Practices of the Capability Maturity Model SM, Version 1.1. This was a joint project of DoD and Carnegie Mellon University. It identifies five levels of practices; the first two are:

2.4.1 Level 1 – The Initial Level
“At the Initial Level, the organization typically does not provide a stable environment for developing and maintaining software. When an organization lacks sound management practices, the benefits of good software engineering practices are undermined by ineffective planning and reaction-driven commitment systems.
….
“The software process capability of Level 1 organizations is unpredictable because the software process is constantly changed or modified as the work progresses (i.e., the process is ad hoc).”
2.4.2 Level 2 – The Repeatable Level
“At the Repeatable Level, policies for managing a software project and procedures to implement those policies are established. Planning and managing new projects is based on experience with similar projects. An objective in achieving Level 2 is to institutionalize effective management processes for software projects, which allow organizations to repeat successful practices developed on earlier projects, although the specific processes implemented by the projects may differ. An effective process can be characterized as practiced, documented, enforced, trained, measured, and able to improve.”

As someone who worked in data collection in the late 80’s and early 90’s for a branch of the federal government, I know that I always maintained a copy of the original data. Anyone competent would, it’s only common sense.

There are only a few reasons why one would not still have it:

1) The data was destroyed. Could’ve happened.
2) The person processing it was incompetent. I don’t know anyone who doesn’t protect the raw data.
3) Someone doesn’t want you to have it.

I’ll try to take a look at the US data. I did a number of posts last year (see Jones category) when we got the China information. For the China stations, Jones et al 1990 stated that they had examined station histories (metadata). However, there is convincing evidence that the station histories did not exist in 1990 and that this claim was untrue. Doug Keenan has filed a misconduct complaint against one of the authors. At this point, it looks like both halves of the data are contaminated by UHI and inhomogeneity. So the fact that both halves have similar trends proves nothing.

This is exactly the same problem that we’ve seen with all such studies – the authors (Peterson; or Hansen; or Parker) make a poorly stratified division of their data so that both data sets have UHI impacts. They then observe little difference and conclude that UHI is not a problem for the data set. The “proofs” are always indirect.

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[…] The hurdles one must jump through A.1. NCDC contacted Dr. Groisman who provided Dr. Jones with the data for the west Russian network. Dr. Groisman is located at NCDC but is not a Federal employee. No information on the Chinese or Australian networks is available at NCDC as these data were provided by others. The stations in the west Russian network are: … B) The 502 U.S. HCN stations (“KARLa”in reference 9 of cited paper) are: […]

[…] They also provided information on U.S. stations that I hadn’t requested but appreciated. See here here . The data provided by NOAA consisted only of station lists (the original data having been […]